That Kid Coulda Been Somebody

Procreation is a cherished human tradition dating back to prehistoric times when cavemen, owing to the daily labor intensive struggle for human survival, came up with the idea of reproduction as a means of shifting their responsibility for hunting, gathering, and mowing the lawn to someone other than the cavewomen who were too busy shopping and scrap-booking to be of any assistance.

Even today most couples, and some singles, consider having kids a fashionable thing to do. While there are still those who raise kids solely for the meat, children have become such an important status symbol in your upper socioeconomic groups – coincidentally the same class of people who experience one of the highest levels of infertility among other population segments – that these folks will go to almost any length to obtain offspring, resorting to such cutting edge medical practices as “in-vitro fertilization,” “genetic mapping,” and “kidnapping.”

Granted, widespread infertility in the US is no doubt God’s way of preventing the planet from being overrun by spoiled, dysfunctional, heroin-addled video junkies cruising the streets in $100,000 German sports cars while talking on cell phones. Regardless, our nation’s well-to-do would-be parents seem undaunted, not only fueling a billion dollar fertility industry, but also accounting for over 90% of the gross national products of several Asian nations where “baby factories” housing millions of impregnated women crank out thousands of babies per week, all bound for export to US families.

The irony is, no matter how much money we spend or what level medical science we apply, in the end we parents have little control over how children turn out. All children learn, all children grow, and all parents are proud, as if they alone are responsible for the naturally pre-determined series of chemical reactions and cell divisions that result in the fully grown human beings most babies eventually become. But as every parent of more than one child quickly learns, each child is a unique being with character traits, personalities, and bizarre predilections that extend beyond what mere science and environmental influences can explain.

Not to downplay the role of heredity, but the byproducts of genetics would seem confined more to physical factors – elements such as hair and eye color, height and weight, the ability to walk and chew gum simultaneously, or the capacity to metabolize large quantities of vodka.

My oldest daughter, for example, most certainly tripped and fell into my genetic pool. Tall, willowy, brown-haired, and with all the grace of a blindfolded water buffalo, she is a victim of my DNA through-and-through. Her stalwart, blond-haired, blue-eyed sister, however – possessor of a bellicose nature and hair trigger temper that sends the other children in her preschool running for cover – tends to favor my wife’s Austrian-Italian bouillabaisse.

But here is where the similarity ends. The personalities of these two genetic replicas of my wife and myself are so dramatically different in terms of the extended family tree from which they dangle so as to make us wonder whether they are truly our own, or if they were perhaps switched at birth, mislabeled by the hospital nursery, or even transported into our midst from some other planet or dimension.

So, if not for genetics, how is it that children – and I’m talking about young children under the age of five who have not yet been acculturated (i.e. “brain washed”) into societal customs and norms – come into this world with certain “baggage” in the form of preponderances, predilections, fears, aptitudes, and allegiances to certain professional sports teams which don’t necessarily track with any person, living or dead, within their immediate circle of influence, nor jibe with the contemporary aspects of the times?

Demonic possession is but one explanation. For instance, I must imagine that when baby Ug pointed at a dinosaur towering over the door to his cave and grunted his first word, “Eek!” his kin gazed upon him with pride and satisfaction – everyone except Aunt Glurg who was up to her waistband in the dinosaur’s mouth, knee-highs flailing in the air. Had he, however, pointed to the sky at a circling pterodactyl and said, “Airplane,” his family would have no doubt locked the door to the cave with him outside, certain he was under the influence of evil spirits.

Children requiring exorcisms, while certainly growing in numbers, do not, however, represent a majority population, leaving only one other rational explanation for this observed phenomenon – reincarnation.

The cruel hand of fate notwithstanding, and no matter your religious beliefs or philosophical inclinations, the open-minded must at least entertain the possibility that what we might be witnessing in our children’s behavior is some sort of “bleed-through” from a previous existence in some other lifetime or dimension.

For instance, my oldest is the loud intellectual type. She has never lacked for an opinion concerning what everyone within range of her voice should be doing, saying, or thinking at any given moment, continually spouting commands and directing the destinies of those around her with indiscriminate precision from the time she was able to walk. Granted, just because she’s bossy doesn’t necessarily mean she was once Alexander the Great, Albert Einstein, or Mussolini. But exactly how does a three year old develop the leadership skills of a career army general?

Add that she left the womb with an odd interest in all things supernatural, mysterious and/or paranormal, exhibiting rapt fascination with the Harry Potter series from the tender age of four as if during our nightly readings I was quoting the Bible or True Crime magazine, and more experienced parents might be left scratching their heads. With no frame of reference against which to judge her, however, my wife and I thought her more or less normal… until the next child happened along.

Whereas daughter number one favors a cerebral approach to most situations, employing logic and reasoning to resolve her problems, her younger sister prefers a hammer. And just because we caught her when she was not quite two shoving Disney Princess figurines into the mouth of her Little Tykes volcano, doesn’t mean she was a former high priestess of some ancient tribe who dabbled in human sacrifice, just as her innate obsession with trains and railroads is no guarantee she was once George Mortimer Pullman. When you consider, however, her irrational fear of balls, the picture becomes less clear.

Most persons would agree that balls, in and of themselves, are relatively benign – certainly not diabolical or fearsome at any intrinsic level. Even so, from the time she was able to simultaneously sit upright and drool, our youngest has perceived lurking within most orb-like objects an incarnate evil that once sent her scooting backwards up the gymnasium wall during a park district mommy-and-me program.

Writing it off to the unexplained, some months later we visited my parents’ house. My mother has never failed to fall prey to every television info-mercial, direct mail scam, or telemarketing sales pitch that has crossed her field of view. As such, when those huge exercise balls – the sort one sits upon while watching TV in the hope of achieving some perceived sense of fitness – were all the rage, my mother naturally ordered one.

When we carried our youngest into the house and plopped her down on the family room floor, she immediately spotted the huge yellow ball resting playfully in the corner and began screaming, wide-eyed and terrified, employing any means within her ability to ambulate her self away from the danger.

Aside from the fact she learned to crawl that day, the event is etched in our minds as one of our more harrowing experiences as parents. Even now at two-and-a-half, she will still peer around every corner and doorway of my parents’ house in search of the evil yellow sphere. My mother keeps the feared object stowed thoughtfully in the basement from where, within minutes of our arrival, our oldest will retrieve it merely to experience the pure joy of causing her younger sibling untold anxiety and distress.

In an effort to help you better understand your kids, below are some examples of things to watch for that may well indicate your child has some connection to a previous life. (Note – does not apply to Chinese children who are naturally gifted and far smarter than non-Chinese children of the same age):

1. Fondly recalls the good old days before cars.
2. Her first word was in fluent Latin.
3. Points to picture of Methuselah, shouts “Look! Daddy!”
4. Asked Santa to bring him a velocipede for Christmas.
5. Can identify Atlantis on a map and point to the house she grew up in.
6. Refers to the refrigerator as an “ice box.”
7. Can construct a geometrically perfect replica of the Great Pyramid with Lego’s, including heretofore undiscovered interior chambers.
8. Can tell time, but only with a sundial.
9. Is able to print her name in Cyrillic.
10. Was able to play “Mozart’s Piano Concerto in A” before he could walk.
11. First crayon drawing was of a reasonably accurate human DNA strand.
12. Expresses remorse over how he and his friends treated Jesus that one day.
13. Shows unusual proficiency with a broadsword.
14. Has been terrified of the ocean ever since “that Titanic incident.”
15. Refuses to leave the house without his powdered wig.
16. Remembers Abraham Lincoln as having chronic halitosis.
17. Complains of having had to carry those heavy stone tablets all the way back down Mt. Sinai without any help.
18. Refuses to eat anything but bison.
19. Is an expert at celestial navigation.
20. Has a morbid fear of animals that have been extinct for millions of years.

So next time you gaze down in wonder at the sweet, smiling face of your child, thinking to yourself, “Wow – what a weirdo,” think again. He or she could have been, as Bill and Ted so aptly put, “A famous dead dude.”